EASY Does It — Emeryville’s Monthly Porsche Meet
If you’re looking for a Porsche zeitgeist, look no further than the R Gruppe meet held every month at European Auto Salvage Yard (EASY) in Emeryville, California.
Despite the “European Auto” part of its name, they have evolved to be essentially a Porsche-only store.
Err, don’t mind the Toyota forklift there.
The inside can best be described as “organized chaos”. Hundreds of similar parts are all piled together.
At least there’s a rack for the crankshafts.
There are several old chassis laying around, but most of them have been picked over quite extensively.
But what we really came to see were the complete cars. As usual, I met up with Art in San Francisco and we cruised over the Bay Bridge in his 993.
A rare soft window Targa…definitely better looking when the top is down!
914’s seem to be making a comeback. Any air-cooled Porsche has a future, it seems.
Gotta give a shoutout to some of my friends. First Lane in his 944…
…Ruben in his 964…
…Greg and Linda in their 356…
…and standing out juuuust a little bit, Jono in his 991 GT3 RS.
Most of the cars there were of the old air-cooled variety. I love modern Porsches, probably more than the next guy, but there’s just so much character in old Porsches.
Take colors for example. You like green?
Three cars, three different greens. Try finding that at a Ferrari show.
And it doesn’t stop there–there are so many colors that it’s almost refreshing to see a white, silver, or black car.
What kind of sports car looks good in brown? For some reason Porsches can always pull it off.
This car is interesting, because hiding inside the sugar scoop lights are modern LED lamps.
Pretty trippy, eh? I would be all over those lights if they didn’t say “GE” right in the middle.
You could whine all day about how popularity “ruined” the air-cooled scene, but I prefer to think of the positive aspects. Lane mentioned how the R Gruppe meets of a few years ago were “six dudes standing next to their cars”, but there were so many people at this gathering that even incredibly sexy cars were spilled out onto the side streets.
Now that’s what I call traffic!
This Chevrolet Corvair is clearly not a Porsche—or is it? Many of its key components have been swapped out for Porsche gear. Not only is it running an air-cooled Porsche flat-six, but it has some other details…
…like Porsche brakes hiding behind Porsche spare wheels.
It even has the dashboard out of a 964!
Speaking of unique, how about this?
Water-cooled Subaru boxer in a long-hood—genius, or blasphemy? I’ll let you think about that one.
Oh, and one more pic of when we stopped by Cars Dawydiak in San Francisco on the way back.
Hands On Driving
I’m still not entirely sure about what an “analog car” consists of, but I do know that it probably starts with one of those.
Everybody Says That
“You did it! Congratulations! World’s Best Cup of Coffee!”
Remember that line from the movie Elf? Will Ferrell (as an elf) is walking down the street and he sees a diner with a sign in the window that says “World’s Best Cup of Coffee”, which causes him to run inside and make that proclamation. Of course, the joke is that people (or is it only Americans?) use the term “World’s Best” to advertise all sorts of products, which Will Ferrell (as an elf) had no concept of.
But for each type of product that exists, there has to be something that’s “the best”. So when it comes to a hotly debated subject such as sandwiches, everybody has their opinion.
Well, here’s mine: The Ace of Sandwiches, located in Palo Alto, is my pick for “best sandwiches”. Certainly in Palo Alto, at least. Maybe in California. Maybe in the world! If there’s a better sandwich out there, I’d like to try it.
Since it’s right down the street from where I work, I’m a frequent customer. They recently redid the layout of their parking lot, leaving a huge space right out front. And it’s always vacant, because it’s a handicapped parking spot. Every time I go there, a vision of a particular shot appears in my head. One sunny day, I said to myself, I’ll get a brightly colored car, park it right in front of the store, and take a sweet snap of it.
Well, last week, I did. And it came out just like I had imagined! Perhaps this is the beginning of some sort of series?
A New High
I’m pretty proud of that photo. I usually don’t like to talk about my own work (mainly because I feel that it has a long way to go), but I think this photo is a real zinger.
Nice composition full of top-notch elements; an iconic bridge, the beautiful California coastline and a beautiful Porsche 911. The only real downside to this photo is the shadow of the giant pole in front of the car, which I could possibly Photoshop out, but prefer to leave intact for some reason.
I had to wait a while for that shot. Bixby Bridge is a pretty touristy spot, and there were dozens of cars parked not far away.
While I was waiting, the shadows were a bit more mellow due to the roving marine layer providing diffused light here and there. In my head I kept shouting “hurry the hell up!” while knowing full well that these old farts had as much right to be standing there snapping as I had to be clinging on 15 feet up a rock wall waiting for them.
The “real” photo ended up with a bit harsher light due to more direct sun, but then again that means the image has more contrast, which is probably a good thing. The only downside is that the pole’s shadow is stronger. Then again, I kind of like the horizontal element of that shadow for some reason.
And here’s a bonus snap of my chariot from while I was waiting for those dudes to move.
Star Road 